Florida's legislature last night began the process of trying to force the presidential selection in favour of the Republicans by approving a list of 25 electors pledged to select George W Bush.

The resolution was designed to hand all the state's votes in the electoral college to the Texas governor and assure him of victory whether or not a recount was approved by the US Supreme Court. It was fiercely opposed by Democrats who accused the Bush camp of trying to hijack the election and creating a dangerous constitutional precedent.

The vote took place in the lower house and the resolution will pass to the state senate - with an inbuilt Republican majority of 25-15 - today. It is not clear whether the senate will wait for a US supreme court verdict on whether Florida recounts can continue before it ratifies the pro-Bush list.

If the court finds in favour of Mr Gore but the legislature goes for Mr Bush, then the US could find itself in the midst of a constitutional crisis.

Yesterday it was revealed that the wife of one of the nine US supreme court justices whose decision could hand the White House to Mr Bush is helping to recruit political staff to a Bush administration.

Ginni Thomas, whose husband Clarence Thomas is one of the conservative group of judges that has supported Mr Bush in two actions in the past month, is working at a prominent conservative think-tank in Washington where she is coordinating rightwing recruitment for the Republican leader.

Mrs Thomas works for the Heritage Foundation and is actively approaching Republicans to come and work for Mr Bush if he becomes president. Earlier this month, she sent an email to Republican political staff members on Capitol Hill inviting them to submit their CVs "for transition purposes".

Justice Thomas has played a low-key role in the Bush v Gore case in which the supreme court heard oral arguments in Washington on Monday.

Alone among the nine justices, Justice Thomas did not ask a single question on Monday. But Judge Gilbert Merritt, a federal judge in Tennessee with personal ties to the Gore family, said in an interview yesterday that Justice Thomas faced a conflict of interest due to his wife's involvement and should stand down from the case.

If he were to step down, the court could be split 4-4 on the Bush v Gore case. In the event of a tie, the original ruling by the Florida supreme court allowing counts of Florida's "undervotes" would stand.

"The spouse has obviously got a substantial interest that could be affected by the outcome," Judge Merritt said. "You should disqualify yourself. I think he'd be subject to some kind of investigation in the Senate."

Judge Merritt cited section 455 of Title 28 of the United States Code in support of his call. The provision requires court officers to excuse themselves from a case if their spouse has "an interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of the proceeding".

"There is no conflict here," Mrs Thomas told the New York Times yesterday. She said she rarely discusses court matters with her husband.

Kathy Arberg, a spokeswoman for the supreme court, said she had no comment on the claims. She also refused to comment on a separate revelation that Eugene Scalia, the son of a second conservative member of the court, Justice Antonin Scalia, is a law partner of Ted Olson, who acted for Mr Bush in the two cases he brought to the court in the past two weeks.

As the Thomas row flared yesterday, America had no option but to submit itself to a nerve-wracking national ordeal by tension.

But the country could be waiting for some time for a ruling. Lawyers pointed out that the supreme court's record fastest time for handing down a judgment following oral argument is three days after the hearing.

The two men at the centre of the storm continued to watch and wait along with everyone else. Mr Gore, whose mood was described by his aides as "determined and resolute", spent another day at his official residence in Washington.

Meanwhile, Mr Bush planned another business-as-usual day in Austin, saying that after talking to his lawyers he was "cautiously optimistic" about the outcome of the court's decision.